Exhale

At the Hospital, I am your mother —

Content Warning: This piece mentions the feelings of & after a car accident with the feelings about & with a mother.

A version of this essay was published in The Ignatian Literary Magazine in 2023.

My friend the crane who visited me in the spring of 2022 & again in the fall of 2022, to represent the cycles of change. The crane landed in the lake by my house, which serves as a controlled water store for crop irrigation in Boulder County, Colorado.

After the car accident, I refused the ride in the ambulance because I knew that my mom didn’t have health insurance and we couldn’t afford it.

I did have health insurance through my father’s job, but I didn’t understand it or know how to access it.

The paramedic handed me the refusal form and I signed using my good arm and said, “Please tell them I mean no harm. I’m okay. Don’t worry. I’ll drive my mom to the hospital.” My other wrist was injured. I didn’t know how to drive.

I was worried the ambulance drivers would find me rude for refusing to ride with them. I was worried about being mean. For taking up the time and space of these paramedics after my mother and I wrecked: were driven into, were sideswiped, were enraptured in a car accident.

Presently, I reflect on this situation and this younger-self: an anxious 16-year-old.

She was always lonely, often confused, often felt internally chaotic: She refused…